The question of Tendulkar in ODIs

The Indian team was back to looking out of its depth on their Australian tour, crashing to a 65-run defeat in the opening ODI of the tri-series. A loss as large as this one merits a cricketing introspection of where what went wrong on the field. But it also raises the larger question of whether India did everything right off the field before stepping in to play.

One of the questions raised ought to be on the selection of Sachin Tendulkar. That Tendulkar failed in the first ODI is irrelevant. The question is: why is he still playing ODIs? Tendulkar's inclusion in the Indian ODI squad meant that there will always be at least one person who has to sit out of the playing eleven, who should be part of it. This is what makes the ODI situation dissimlar to the one the Test side faced. There isn't any obvious replacement for Tendulkar in the Test side, and a sudden transition is not going to happen if he isn't in the ODI side. In fact, the ODI side has been playing largely without him for two years, and there are plenty of claimants to spots.

That Tendulkar might very well go on to score big in the series is possible. Given his class, Tendulkar scoring big is never ruled out, and it is indeed probable more than possible. But his big scores, or lack of them, are not the points in question. It's a question of building a side for India that can do well in the future. And the key is there isn't a dearth of players who can play in the ODI squad if Tendulkar isn't there.

There is also the question of India defending their title in the 2015 World Cup. Normally, an event that is three years away does not merit much detailed planning in the here and now, but in this case, the here-and-now is in Australia - which happens to be the venue of the 2015 World Cup. India should give themselves the best chance of defending their hard-won World Cup title by including the people who would form a core of that defence three years hence. And Tendulkar isn't going to be around till then. The Australian crowds may have given him two standing ovations on India's last two tours, but it would be foolishly optimistic to expect him to be around for the next tour. Even if his form holds - and again, it's Tendulkar so it's possible his form will hold good - if he stays on that long, it will affect the transition for the Indian team.

His fitness to last that long will be much more suspect than his form, and India can't afford to have a Tendulkar who plays one ODI tournament a year. That throws the balance of the team out of kilter, and only the World Cup is an important enough tournament to warrant that kind of picking. If a World Cup was around the corner, then it would make sense for Tendulkar to play the occasional ODI so that he could stay in touch with the format and India could avail of his services in the tournament. But there isn't one for another three years.

Tendulkar has achieved pretty much everything that any man could dream of achieving in the ODI arena. World Cup? Done. Most runs? Done (and likely to stay for a long, long time). Ditto with centuries. He's played some of the most memorable knocks ever seen in ODI cricket - never more so than at Sharjah in 1998. He paved the way for the rest of the world by hitting the first double ton in the format. He's even had his moments with the ball in ODIs. He'll go down in many peoples' reckoning (this writer included) as the finest ODI batsman ever.

He might be playing purely because he loves to compete, and for the love of the game. But one man's love of the game - no matter how great the man or how deep the love - cannot stand in the way of the greater interest of the country and team. All good things come to end. At some point, all good men depart, and all the sweetest relationships end. One of those endings has to be scripted now, no matter how hard.